


On a Whim

by estike



Category: All for One - Takarazuka Revue
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-13
Updated: 2019-05-13
Packaged: 2020-03-02 15:45:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18813991
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/estike/pseuds/estike
Summary: Wind up with a strangerFall in love on a whim(A masquerade!)Bernardo stumbles into the most beautiful girl in the world during a masquerade ball and falls head over heels,while I continue writing All for One fanfiction that includes a shameless amount of crossdressing.





	On a Whim

**Author's Note:**

> Now with more dialogue than I've ever written in my life.

Brightly lit halls, sonorous, constant music, colourful gowns, faces tinted by rouge and alcohol, amused cries, and endless chatter. A masquerade ball has perhaps everything Bernardo hates.

Maybe minus the masks. The masks are almost fun. Being around fully sober people proves to be a challenge already, but when they decide to alter their own state of mind with wine…

Bernardo sighs and hides his frown with his black feathery visor. He warned his uncle already: masquerade or not, he would not give up on his black garments for anything. As the captain of the guards, his here on business, after all, and not to parade himself around.

Philippe waves him off from the other side of the banquet hall, with a cup in hand. Thinking that it is about something important, Bernardo immediately skips to his side, crossing the sea of guests.

Philippe hands him the cup. “Loosen up, Bernardo. You are ruining the atmosphere by constantly playing the gloomy black cloud. Drink some wine. Show a dimple. Fall in love. Kiss a girl!”

Without taking the glass, Bernardo ducks his head between his shoulders and adjusts the feathers on his hat, as he tries to gracefully handle the situation.

“I am not here to be indecent.”

Philippe indulgently caresses his moustache, and he is sure he can spot a mischievous glimmer hiding in his eyes. “But you wish you were.”

His cheeks grow hot, but he tries to ignore that fact by elevating his shoulders, even more, trying to bury himself between them, before he would leave his brother behind. He isn’t the sibling who is only famous for pining for a kiss or two from the queen of Spain after all!

Disgusting.

The King was not simply some kiss-wish, he had to do and feel and want that by some higher Principle. You see, if d’Artagnan wanted something, anything, he must want it tenfold, and have it before him.

People do not understand this.

They do not understand the poetic severity of animosity between two similarly aged young men, who share the same pursuits in life.

Actually, Bernardo does not understand it either.

He only understands the fatal urge that beckons him to spit, fight, and insult, whenever he is forced to share a space with d’Artagnan. But other people, they think like Philippe, in love, in kisses, in affection.

Bernardo? He doesn’t think.

Of course.

These days the air in the palace is filled with love and lust and yearning to the point that it hurts his nose.

Bernardo scoffs, as he thinks to himself, then turns around to look for Claude. Earlier this evening, he noticed something off at the palace’s entrance. Namely, a far too familiar stench. He must look into that as soon as possible before some stinky Musketeer would ruin the night. 

But where on earth is Claude?

Then, before all that, the collision.

The world could have stopped altogether, just for time to be reset once more, pushing him from one path of life towards a while different one. Unknown, and frightening.

He doesn’t remember anything but bumping into a large, hard surface, breast to breast. Nose to nose.

Then, the scent. Lovely, lovely scent of the sunshine mixed with the welcoming fragrance of the soil. He cannot even begin to feel angry.

“Oh my,” he breathes, sniffling into the air as he removes himself from whatever he collided into.

He looks.

“Oh my,” Bernardo says again.

Is this the first time in his life? Bernardo does not remember ever feeling so rushed and yet so calm, and yet so…

He sees a slightly troubled face. Beautiful black eyes. Beautiful hooked nose. Beautiful wide shoulders. Beautiful, lopsided, albeit nervous smile.

Bernardo’s mouth falls open and stays that way. Suddenly, he feels the urge to speak in his mother tongue. This seems to fluster the most beautiful girl in the world even more, and she hides behind her fan – not being able to find her mask in time.

“I…” she says.

Deep voice. Lovely, deep voice.

“No, it was me,” Bernardo cuts in, admitting that he was in the wrong. Quite unlike himself. “I wasn’t watching where I was going. Pardon me.”

The most beautiful girl in the world makes a long “mmm” sound, somewhere between confused and relieved.

That awakens something in him. He heard that before. “Have we met before? I have seen you somewhere before.”

“I don’t think so! I have never left… Gascony before coming here on a visit for this occasion.” Gascony! That must be where the angels live. “… but I should go.”

Before he could think, his fingers tie around the wrist of the most beautiful girl in the world, holding her back. He is met with unexpected force. Bernardo blushes to the tip of his ears. What a lovely, powerful woman.

“I am Bernardo, the captain of the guardsmen,” he introduces himself, hoping that it would impress her.

“I know,” she says. Plainly.

“You know!?”

They struggle at the hands, one wanting to leave, and one refusing to let go.

“Eugh… I mean… who would not know the famous captain of the guardsmen… right?”

“At least tell me your name before you leave!” But Bernardo has no intentions of letting her go at all.

She stares at him blankly for a few seconds. If Bernardo didn’t know better, he would think that she forgot her own name and now will have to think about it.

“Charle… Charlotte.”

Charlotte! What a lovely name. Befitting of the most beautiful girl in the world. She tries to rip her hand out of his one more time.

“Charlotte, I love you!” Bernardo declares quickly, to stop her. “Charlotte, I have never met another person who would make me feel the things you make me feel right now. I can’t leave you alone just now." 

He sniffles, drifting closer to her. “Your scent. It’s like the sunshine and the soil.”

Pleasant, always ready to embrace him. Later he would curse himself for saying all these silly things out loud, all these things he kept for himself before and transformed into insults instead. But tonight, Bernardo is a man reborn.

“With just one glance, you made me awaken to the charms of women!”

Charlotte looks nothing less than mortified.

“Bernardo, that cannot be,” she says.

Bernardo looks down on their hands. She’s sun-kissed, not unlike himself. Almost the same, healthy brown colour. It’s so refreshing to find a woman with big, firm hands, and tanned skin. Beautiful, thick eyebrows. Beautiful, tall frame. Beautiful, fat cheeks.

This is love…? He has never known love and now it all came barging into his life like the happiest cannon hat was meant to break even the thickest of walls.

If only d’Artagnan was here! If only he was here to witness the purity and the beauty of his love. Outshining his and the King's a thousandfold. Then, he would be fully satisfied.

“Charlotte,” he says again, for good measure. His hands warm hers. “Come with me. Let’s go somewhere.”

“… don’t you have some captaining to do?”

Bernardo shakes his head. It’s fine. There are so many guards on duty tonight, he wants to learn more about Charlotte instead. For a moment, her reluctance grows, and then it is all gone. Charlotte gives in. Alright.

She comes wherever Bernardo leads.

He catches the strange look that comes from his uncle and Marie-Louise as he leads the most beautiful girl in the world out of the banquet hall, but he decides to ignore both of them.

Tonight is his night. Not Maria Theresa’s. Not the King’s. Not his uncle’s.

Everything exists for his Charlotte.

Wanting some quiet, he decides to lead her to the library room, far away from the clamour of the ball. They need to be surrounded by knowledge, and the scent of old codices and all sorts of bookish things his uncle seems to like. He wouldn’t know.

As the silence settles between them, Charlotte tries to place the mask back on her face, but Bernardo protests. “No. No! Let me see you.”

“But it’s a masquerade ball.”

He takes the mask out of her hand and hides it behind his back. “I saw you already. No need to hide.”

Charlotte’s eyes grow twice their size when he says that, and she hides her mouth as she speaks as if she was about to cough.

“Maybe things will change if you keep looking at me from up close.”

Bernardo smiles to himself, a stupid boy in love.

“Charlotte,” he says again because it feels nice to say it. “Let me learn about you. And I will let you learn about me.”

Still, Charlotte attempts to snatch her mask back a few times, but to no avail. The more she tries, the more it seems like she is about to embrace Bernardo, which makes his heart leap and leap several times.

“What do you like,” Bernardo asks, in a demanding tone, once she’s done with fighting.

A moment of silence. He can almost hear her think.

“… swords,” she finally answers.

“Swords! What a coincidence… I happen to like swords too. What kind!”

For the first time, the glimmer in his eyes is returned in hers.

She opens up, even if only a little.

When asked how the most beautiful girl in the world learned how to use the sword, Charlotte bites a brazen smile into her lips, showing a delightful double-chin.

“My father taught me all he knew,” she claims.

“Is that normal? In Gascony?”

Bernardo draws her to the nearest divan, so they can sit and talk comfortably. And hold hands, of course. Charlotte’s skirt is folding over his right leg.

“I had a special interest.”

The smile finally spreads all over her face. It definitely is the loveliest smile Bernardo has ever seen.

“I was a troublesome child,” Charlotte continues, then corrects herself. “… girl. Child-girl. Young lady.”

“Oh… I was always heartless and cruel,” Bernardo brags, straight back at her. “Once I pulled Philippe’s hair and he didn’t even do nothing.”

As Charlotte sits, her white petticoat peeks out at her legs. It’s charming. What is even more charming is her deep, warm giggle.

“So… you are a bad man, Bernardo?”

“… very. One can say that.” He’s proud, lifting his chin up high.

Charlotte is amused. “Tell me about your evil deeds?”

Bernardo tilts his head, trying to think back on the atrocities he has committed in his short, but oh, definitely heartless and cruel life.

Nothing comes to mind. It’s the outward pressure.

“… I spy after people,” he announces after a long period of staring at the upper corner of the room. “Do you know the Musketeers?”

A shadow in Charlotte’s eyes.

“Oh. Tell me more?”

He explains the Thing about the Musketeers. They are awful. But not like Bernardo. Bernardo would never be inconsiderate towards the King, or his uncle. He is only heartless towards the people who deserve no more. (Like d’Artagnan! For example!)

He tangles himself into a confusing explanation, trying bot to convince Charlotte that he is indeed the coolest and most dangerous man alive – but also that he is better and more virtuous than anyone she may have ever met.

“Loyalty, you see, is the most important quality of them all. And I am loyal, Charlotte.”

“Aren’t the Musketeers, too?”

“You know!” Bernardo tries to whisper, but he is too excited to keep his voice down. “They are not loyal to the king. I spied… so I know that they are planning an insurrection against His Majesty… That isn’t loyalty.”

And you could say anything about Bernardo, heartless and cruel (those things are cool), he also somehow fit enough reverence into his non-existent heart towards his uncle and his King. For good measure.

He rubs Charlotte’s hand.

“I am loyal, you know. I do not change my mind, almost ever, if I have chosen the one.”

Just like d’Artagnan: there is no space for hesitation. And by the way! See? He also chose d’Artagnan for himself as his supreme enemy and loyally hated him with all his being ever since the first time he laid his eyes on him. Easy as that.

“And I could protect you better than anyone.”

Charlotte covers his hand with hers. “What if I don’t need that? I know a thing or two about swords, after all.”

“Who knows… you might need it once. … And besides… I wish to test your skill with the sword.”

“Huh?” Charlotte shakes her head. She sounds an ugly cackle, and Bernardo finds it absolutely lovely. “You really are obsessed with that, aren’t you?”

Bernardo is at loss for an answer. This is the first time he ever thought about fighting her at all! But can she blame him, for wanting to see what a woman can do with a sword?

“Tell me more about yourself,” he asks then.

Charlotte talks about her father, the sword, and her friends in the village. The fights she would get into, which she would say were only for “justice.”

Bernardo presses his luck and softly touches the broken line of her nose.

“This is from justice too?” he asks, and he finally manages to whisper, even.

“Perhaps. Or perhaps I was just born this way.”

“It’s beautiful,” Bernardo thinks. “The nicest nose I’ve ever seen in my life.”

He draws her closer towards himself by the waist, a little clumsily, if not aggressively. Hugging her to him, he attempts to press their lips together.

He can feel teeth knocking against teeth.

“Bernardo!” Charlotte exclaims.

“I really want to kiss.”

She rests her hand on his chest in a familiar manner, and yet, tries to establish some distance between them.

“Bernardo, I think you may come to regret that later.”

“Nothing could make me regret this.”

“Absolutely nothing at all? What if I was affiliated with the Musketeers?”

He doesn’t even give himself time to think about that. The answer is already on his tongue. “I do not care who you are, Charlotte. I could not unlove you now.”

“We just met!”

“And what a lovely meeting it was.”

Footsteps sound near them, outside the library, so Charlotte slides a hand on Bernardo’s mouth, trying to prevent him from yelling any further. His heart beats loudly against his chest. The reactions his body has, not unlike the reactions he would have during a duel, almost unsettle him. Once the danger is done, Charlotte playfully draws her finger down his jaw.

“Then, I will stay with you tonight,” she promises.

“And?”

“And, for every fact you tell me about yourself, you may get a kiss.” Bernardo looks at her with big, beady eyes. “I need to know about you first if I want to decide whether I would like you at all, or not.”

He withdraws. “Am I not handsome enough!?”

“You’re lovely.”

Bernardo purses his lips up. “I say one thing, and you say one in return. … then, we kiss.”

Laughing, Charlotte accepts his terms.

They start with favourite colours. (Black, blue.) Then, their mothers’ given names, then favourite childhood memories, then, siblings, then, hometowns.

Bernardo talks about Rome as it was yesterday that he left. He learns about the abundant fields of Gascony. He almost wants to go and see it himself.

Then, the next moment, he finds himself drawn into Charlotte’s lap, unable to stop with a quick peck he was supposed to get as his reward.

His face flushes all red, but he is nested so comfortably on the rough, blue fabric of Charlotte’s dress, he never wants to leave. She cups his face with the warmest smile he has ever seen. He always wanted to be looked at, deep inside, and finally! Finally he is being seen.

Seen by the most beautiful girl in the world, at that.

So much time passes, with kissing and kissing, but Bernardo doesn’t even realize until Charlotte nudges him.

“We should leave,” she urges. “Everything quietened down.”

“I don’t want to go.”

Another kiss. Charlotte gently but firmly removes Bernardo from her lap.

“I must go. It is getting late.”

“I’ll show you out… At least of the library.”

He holds Charlotte’s hand so they can spend a little more time together. The hallways are unusually quiet, with only a few palace guards loitering around.

“I will see you tomorrow, Charlotte?”

Before, he thought that three days of festivities were too much just to welcome the queen of Spain, but suddenly it seems too short.

“I might not attend tomorrow night.”

“You must! You absolutely must!”

Charlotte is slightly taller than him, he notices now, as they walk next to each other. It must be the heels, he figures.

“You really are lovely, Bernardo, but…”

“I want to see you again.”

Charlotte presses one last kiss on his lips. “I am afraid you may not want to see me again. But if you do, come to the Tavern to the Chevalier the night before the queen’s reception is over.”

Why wouldn’t he want to see her! Before Bernardo could stop her, the most beautiful girl in the world runs off and leaves him behind, looking like a fool, with his fingers pressed against his lips where he was kissed, and the palace guards silently measuring him up.

Shrugging to himself, Bernardo retreats to his uncle’s quarters, to catch up with the news of the night. Philippe is there, too, and Marie Louise.

“Bernardo!” Marie Louise complains. “You’ve been gone for the whole night!”

“I was busy. With the most beautiful girl in the world.”

“We know,” Marie Louise snaps before he could go on. “You upset the King, you know! By spending the whole night with her lover so shamelessly. Everyone could see you leading him out of the room.”

“What!”

“The King was wholly upset. You were kissing d’Artagnan in a gown the whole night, weren’t you!”

Bernardo recoils.

“No way!”

D’Artagnan can absolutely not be the most beautiful girl in the world…

He stinks. He stinks of the sun and the earth while her scent is lovely like the sunshine and the soil… He does not know how to dress, while she looks lovely even in a washed-out blue gown. His voice is scratchy and unpleasant and hers is deep and caresses him like velvet.

No. No way…

“You were with d’Artagnan, who dressed up as a woman the whole night… you did know that, didn’t you?” Marie Louise asks, again. “The King was very upset the whole night, I had to be there to comfort him… And here uncle thought you were going to try and seize him, without making a scene.”

“No way,” Bernardo says again, laughing it off.

Only a fool would look at Charlotte and think that it’s d’Artagnan!

“And besides, why would d’Artagnan wear a skirt? He’s a man,” he adds, trying to get his point across.

“To disguise himself, of course, and avoid being caught,” Mazarin tells him.

No… it cannot be that even his uncle believes this.

“The guests went through strict scrutiny by my men and the palace guards… He couldn’t have just snuck in.”

Marie Louise shakes her head. “Do you think that the King doesn’t recognize her lover?”

“Well… she probably isn’t as smart as I thought she was if she thinks that Charlotte is d’Artagnan.”

He spends the next hour trying to debate the Charlotte case with his family, wondering how all of these people could see the same nightmare at the same time. Charlotte and d’Artagnan are nothing alike! After Philippe and Mazarin both call him stupid a few times, Bernardo has enough.

"This was not what I meant when I told you to fall in love and kiss a girl!" Philippe laments. 

He cannot spare his time on people who cannot even properly see what is before their very eyes.

If only he could fetch Charlotte for himself, bring it before them, and convince everyone that the King, his uncle, Philippe, and everyone, everyone is wrong about her…  

It is not the night Charlotte bid him to meet, but perhaps, she stays over at The Tavern to the Chevalier, Bernardo thinks. A strange choice, but he cannot blame her (for anything).

Within minutes, he makes it back to his chambers and fetches the closest cape he could find.

The night almost turns into day, but he must find Charlotte. If not to bring her back to the palace to prove that he is right, then just to kiss her again.


End file.
